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I noticed in another thread he put a link to this email. Mods, if you wish you can move, delete, or what have you to this post.
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Subject: A Public Letter about Bitcoinica

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                                                 A Public Letter about Bitcoinica



Why?

You are receiving this email because I, Zhou Tong, want to update you about Bitcoinica's recent events, and clarify some frequently
asked questions by Bitcoinica customers.

I still have your email address because Bitcoinica shared the available account information with me so that I can help them process
the claims. I won't use your email address for purposes other than communicating Bitcoinica-related matters.

Apology

First all, I would like to apologize to all affected users. As many of you know, I'm reaching 18 years old this year, and even though
the Bitcoinica venture was extremely exciting and eye-opening for a teenager, I have to admit that I could have displayed a higher
level of maturity and professionalism in some matters.

Also, I also have to admit that a lot of the business circumstances were well beyond my scope of understanding. I assure you that I
have learned the relevant lessons and I will do a much better job in my next project ? NameTerrific [nameterrific.cmail4.com].

The "Mt. Gox Hack"

Bitcoinica experienced the third major hack on July 12, 2012. According to Bitcoinica's announcement [nameterrific.cmail4.com],
40,000 BTC and $40,000 were stolen.

It's regrettable that the master password of Bitcoinica's LastPass account, which includes the crentials required to access its main
Mt. Gox account with all unpaid funds, was found to be the same as one API key in the source code leaked on July 7, 2012
[nameterrific.cmail4.com].

On July 26, AurumXchange has posted a statement [nameterrific.cmail4.com] publicly stating some information found in the recent
Bitcoinica hack. I was pointed to be an important suspect due to a link of this hack to one of my "sockpuppet" email addresses used
for anonymously testing websites. After a short period, I have replied to emphasize this fact [nameterrific.cmail4.com] and also a
possible email hack.

It's important to note that I have never used this email for any official purpose, and it should not be used to identify me
personally. The email password was a heavily re-used one because nothing inside was intended to be private.

On the same day, I have posted another statement [nameterrific.cmail4.com] about my findings of the evidence left in the email
account. Chen Jianhai has used a credit card of Chris Heaslip (which was also present in the LastPass account) to place an order on
Amazon.com. He was using a freight forwarder address with his real name. Later this order was canceled by Amazon due to fraud.

Chen Jianhai has agreed to return at least $140,000 and 20,000 BTC under the condition that Bitcoinica LP will not start a police
investigation about the hack. I have made it clear to him that I will have zero tolerance on this wrong-doing and if the promised
amount is not paid back, I will make his identifiable information available to the police, and possibly public.

Fund Recovery

Patrick Murck is an experienced lawyer who is also very familiar with Bitcoin. He was asked by some creditors and stakeholders of
Bitcoinica to broker the transactions. I was supposed to be act as an intermediary between the hacker and Patrick Murck to faciliate
the recovery of stolen funds.

A great progress has been achieved in fund recovery and we can expect the funds to be returned to Bitcoinica LP, or its creditors as
soon as the end of next week.

Liquidation

Tihan Seale, who represents Wendon Group (the limited partner of Bitcoinica LP), released a statement [nameterrific.cmail4.com] on
August 2, 2012 detailing the abandonment of legal duty by Bitcoinica Consultancy, the general partner of Bitcoinica LP.

Mr Seale has confirmed that his investment firm will appoint a legal receiver in New Zealand to return all remaining assets owned by
Bitcoinica to creditors, which include all customers with an account balance and/or a position and a verifiable claim. He has also
mentioned that all assets subject to Wendon Group's ownership will be contributed to Bitcoinica customers proportionally.

To my best knowledge, Patrick, Donald or Amir has not responded to the above-mentioned statement publicly.

My Personal Appeal
Here, I would like to appeal to the community and all Bitcoinica customers for acting rationally about recent events.

With the accusations from some active parties in Bitcoin community, I have lost a lot of confidence in myself and my life has been
significantly and negatively impacted. I'm an Agnostic and a Libertarian who believes in living one's life for others' good, and the
accusations are clearly against my value judgement.

Furthermore, there are repeated threats of violence and informal investigations that can put my family, friends and myself into
dangerous situations.

Regardless of your stand in the debates, I appreciate your respect. Whether I'm guilty or not, I have closely experienced the power
of justice and I can assure you I will hate living a life of a criminal. I deeply believe that I can make good use of my web
development skills and business experience into valuable innovations for the society, rather than illegally obtaining properties from
other hardworking people.

My Bitcoinica Experience

In my previous post about leaving Bitcoin [nameterrific.cmail4.com], I mentioned that I didn't really enjoy the outcome of
Bitcoinica:

"I failed at one thing though, that is generating value for the society. Bitcoinica did create a place for people to trade more
efficiently and provide liquidity to the market. However, speculation is a zero-sum game (or negative-sum, strictly saying). I know
there can be many justifications for Bitcoinica's value, but all of them are against my intuition and values."

I want to make it clear (again) that I stand in line with the interest of Bitcoinica customers because you have made me proud of my
creation. Without your support, I wouldn't have moved to Melbourne, and I wouldn't have been so confident about my potential. To me,
like it or not, Bitcoinica was a life-changer, and very possibly an opportunity that I would never encounter again in my whole life.

My first major aim in life is to become a millionaire (in US Dollar) by the age of 21. I set this aim when I was 15. Here, I also
want to thank Tihan for his wonderful acquisition offer, which contributed to the achievement of this aim (though I still have a lot
to go).

Moreover, I have interacted to many Bitcoinica customers personally and I have to say that there's no better way of accumulating
business experience. I'm lucky to have known so many high-net-worth individuals in this community and I believe that many of the
Bitcoinica customers will be helpful in some ways in my future adventures.

Last Words

So, I have:

 *  lost my job
 *  seen my own baby fail
 *  been stuck in a situation beyond my control
 *  been accused of stealing customer funds
 *  contributed most of my Bitcoin savings into personally compensating customers
 *  thought about committing suicide
 *  never had a satisfied sleep since 3 months ago
 *  lost some confidence
 *  felt insecure and nervous for prolonged periods
 *  affected some friendships
 *  delayed the development of my new project significantly
 *  spent a large amount of time in the 200-page debates
 *  skipped a few classes
 *  ruined my professional reputation in some ways

I'm still surviving after all. There's always hope in life, right?

In these three months, I have learned a lot, and experienced all kinds of human emotions, thoughts and value judgements. In one
occasion, I cried over the phone, and my best friend (a 18-year-old student) told me (translated):

"You're already very successful. Not many people can have your experience as a youth entrepreneur, and be such a mature expatriate
and global citizen. The reputation damage will at worst make your future successes arrive later, but they will still come to you,
because you deserve the successes."

I won't give up. I'm not running away. I'm still here to help you get your precious savings back. I know how important the money
stuck in Bitcoinica is to you. It truly means a lot to me.

Meanwhile, I appreciate your support towards my new startup NameTerrific [nameterrific.cmail4.com].

Thank you very much for your support. I hope we can all survive this difficult period together. You are welcome to contact me anytime
at bitcoinica@zhoutong.com.

Best Regards,
Zhou Tong
Founder of Bitcoinica (Yeah, I hate to be the founder.)

You're receiving this because your email is included in my copy of email addresses shared by Bitcoinica's owners.

Edit your subscription [nameterrific.updatemyprofile.com] | Unsubscribe [nameterrific.cmail4.com]

It's best to view the full web version so that all links and formats are enabled (they are there for a purpose).

http://nameterrific.createsend5.com/t/ViewEmail/j/7716A98B996695CD

(Ignore the nameterrific subdomain. I don't have a personal Campaign Monitor account. Your email addresses will NOT be used in NameTerrific marketing.)

Thanks!

Can you tell me, why you see the need to monitor who is viewing this and clicking which links?

And you didn't get a lawyer?  ???

Unfortunately that phrase must be a lie. Libertarians are the most selfish pricks on the planet, and proud of it. In fact the enitre Libertarian ideology can be summed up in 4 words "Got mine, fuck you."

I use Campaign Monitor to send emails to 1,000+ recipients without being banned or categorized as spam. The email addresses were obtained with permission and the content is very close related to Bitcoinica.

I can't use Postmark to send the email with a script because this is not a transactional email. I can't use Gmail because they don't allow so many recipients. I don't want to send emails individually for obvious reasons. I don't want to send the emails with Postfix/sendmail because that will be result in false positives or IP ban (Amazon EC2 IPs are mostly tainted with spam already).

So the only choice is Campaign Monitor, which is very similar to MailChimp.

I'm not interested in tracking the opens or clicks. Campaign Monitor is just a tool to send emails in this case.

Based on experience with other libertarians, that statement is demonstrably false. You must be trying to troll people.

Self-interest is not selfishness.

A mature Libertarian knows that for his needs to be satisfied, he has to do good for others first. In a market, he improves the marginal utility for the counter-party so that the trade can happen mutually voluntarily.

They can only possibly say "got mine, f**k you" when they know they will die soon. Otherwise it's never good for his self-interest.

Don't be ridiculous.  It's, "Fuck you, got mine."

Ugh, this is the most depressing hack ever.  Zhou, I don't trust you, but I really do hope you're doing ok.  Same for Amir.  I'd love to get those coins back, but I've discounted it for my own sanity and largely have ignored this thing for the past several weeks.  I've already said this a bunch of times before, but what this whole experience has driven home to me is the value of controlling my bitcoins.  And so the majority of them sit safely in offline wallets.  At the very least, thanks for really teaching me that they're not my bitcoins if I can't control them.

I stopped reading right here to comment. You telling us that mentioning the relic collector's name is not a threat to you or your family, but an informal investigation by an alpaca is?  ::)

~Bruno~

(back to reading)

He wouldn't believe me that I'm in Australia, lol. He insisted that I was still a student in Singapore.

Maybe he will send someone to my PO Box to look for me. (And the mailman emails me every morning if there's anything in my PO Box, so I go there like once a week.)

But anyway, I don't want to cross the line here by providing more detailed identity information about him. At least he's doing a favour by returning the money. This will be the first ever Bitcoin-related hack that has the funds returned.

Good point! You got me there. Rucky for you he's not smart enough to go to the college you attend in Australia and wait to see if some likeness of you walks out of some Math 101 class. Rucky for you he also doesn't read English or visit this forum to read what I just penned.

A quick question, one I'm sure you'll have no problem answering. Have you ever been to Australia before, prior to starting college there? Be very careful how you answer that question, for some alpaca is about to hand me an envelope.

~Bruno~

Good to hear Chen finally saw some sense and is returning the full 40K USD + 40K BTC

Oh wait..


Zhou, if you did nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear. And your reputation can easily be restored once it turns out you have been doing the right thing all along.

EDIT: However I find it hard to believe a corporate entity such as Bitcoinica LP can agree to these terms set by Chen. I don't even think it is legal. The only way not to be a thief and be exonerated is to return *all* the stolen money. Plain and simple. You can not steal, return half and set terms that amount to blackmail. Maybe you can tell Chen that. He is a multi-millionaire after all.

OK, perfect. Don't start a police investigation, but why don't Bitcoinica LP do its own investigation, gathers evidence & takes this multi-millionaire to court (civil court if a criminal court isn't possible). I don't think a police investigation would help much with a BTC theft anyways.

Perhaps that's the way it's taught at Trinity College which Zhou Tong claims to attend.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity_College_(University_of_Melbourne)

http://www.trinity.unimelb.edu.au/

The 1500 figure represents the 300 residences and the online students.

~Bruno~

I find it odd that you never used that email address to test Mt Gox prior to joining them with via your xwaylab email address and not seen elsewhere on the Mt Gox dump file.

~Bruno~

He didn't steal half.

He stole 40kBTC and $40kUSD (44kBTC total), but is returning 20kBTC and $140kUSD (34kBTC total), so its 10k pocketed.

Keep in mind the BTC value has risen to $10 since the hack, it was hovering around $5 at the time IIRC.

Zhou, you checked your iPod (or whatever ...) to a virus?   ::) (dont laugh, I'm serious, to _ does not exist in the database the virus _ a new virus?)

+1

This is as well the only thief that has been identified. He needs to pay from his pocket any cents missing. And he should be lucky not to be locked up in jail for that amount of money

ZT, I respect the fact that you care and explain to your customers.

Is a experienced lawyer exempt from disclosing to the authorities that they're in procession of stolen funds?

~Bruno~

Client-attorney privilege covers that. P.M. holds the funds "in trust". There's a long history of this type of arrangements to hold up to all kinds of judicial challenges.

I concede on this issue, and this issue alone, unless others bring to light that this is not necessarily the case, but I won't be researching this fact myself.

Thank you, 2112.

~Bruno~

Isn't it's weird/stupid that ZT refuses to get a lawyer?

a minor in Canada for stealing any amount of money through a computer would end up with very little if any jail time at all.... I figure he's in the same boat.... You stole what? Bittycoins?

I don't understand why this so called hacker is only returning $140,000 and 20,000 BTC. I want my 100% claim back and the hacker should pay up if not put him in jail the choice is his.

Phin, you're misunderstanding what the "colleges" within the old universities are.

Only a very small proportion of people - including overseas students - studying at Australian universities live on campus.  Some universities don't even provide student accommodation.  The fact that someone isn't one of the 300 residential students doesn't mean a person is a distance education or flexible delivery student.  Foundation Studies students aren't eligible to be residential students of the College.

Zhou may or may not be in Australia attending Trinity college, but the nature of Trinity college and its programmes neither supports nor refutes that possibility.

To be honest, if you're so damned sure that he's not in Australia, I'm not sure why you haven't asked him to take a photo of himself in front of a uniquely Melbourne landmark holding today's paper instead of trying to prove it through tenuous connections.

Yeah, not shady at all. I wonder if the next e-mail from zhoutong will be one saying that the Bitcoinica Consultancy members have gone to the police and blaming them for the fact that the promised money won't be forthcoming. Somehow I can just imagine everyone here buying into that and blaming it on the person who allegedly called the police on the thief, letting the guy whose passwords and accounts were used and in whose direction the evidence points off scott-free.

Spam mail from Name terrific ..


"Whoa is me... use my other service.."

Have you filed a police report?  

For a forum full of libertarians, I find it hilarious how many people think the government magically gets things done without private intervention.

If you want a particular legal outcome, do something about it.  Whining that someone should go to jail on a forum for stealing your money, but actually doing nothing about it, is just pathetic.

a) Bruno would not believe it, and would claim it is photoshoped, some actor, or something else.
b) Now if Bruno would accept that ZT is exactly what he says, what would he do with all his spare time?

ZT seems to be the only libertarians in here. Everybody else constantly demands police, lawyers, and so on. I am sure they would all be lucky if some government would oversight Bitcoin.

What are police and lawyers going to do to a 17 year old kid? I doubt much... The money that would be involved in taking this guy down would probably be close to what he stole...

Great.  A former employee using Bitcoinica-held customer information for personal communication is just what this clusterfuck needs now.

I'm sorry for those who think this email is redundant or useless.

I obtained the information from Bitcoinica to facilitate fund returns, as an independent individual (not employee). In my opinion updating customers from a personal perspective isn't spamming, and the emails are not unsolicited.

If you feel annoyed, simply unsubscribe and you won't hear from me again.

I wonder if he got permission from said owners of bitcoinica first ? Im sure they are happy he is sending out marketing emails advertising his new service.

I can understand slightly if you wanted to provide information to facilitate things, although I don't necessarily agree. But the promotion of the new service was certainly unsolicited spam and a really cheap shot. You should never have breathed a word about it when sending a mass email.

I think you guys are all crazy for trusting so many bitcoins on an online service.  You know they arn't safe unless they're in your wallet, didn't we learn from mybitcoin? 

You're showing some self insight, which is a good thing, and is promising for your future.


Two more things:

- The 'hacker' needs to pay back all funds in full.
- Most people don't care about you or your personal feelings, they just want their funds back.

(I have no stake here)

Apart from the issue of whether or not you have any right to use the customer information you possess for any reason that isn't directed by those legally responsible for the refund process - which Tihan has stated will be a receiver and then a liquidator - how on earth can any Bitcoinica user be confident that the user information you and others associated with Bitcoinica hold is in any way secure given that you guys haven't been able to adequately protect your own email accounts or critical business information?  

Seriously, every single one of you needs to get whatever Bitcoinica related data you have out of your personal possession and into the hands of someone who is both legally entitled to possess it and legally obligated to properly protect it.  You can't just go around using data you were given access to for a specific purpose for whatever you want.  It's not your personal mailing list and you shouldn't be using it for anything unless you've been specifically authorised to do so by those to whom the user information belongs.  Did the limited partner, the general partner, or Patrick Murck authorise this mail out?

+1

People have been banned before for sending unsolicited email.

So, to be clear, using a mailing list obtained from one entity, then used via another entity to send monetized emails under the guise of providing updates isn't spamming (illegal), correct?

~Bruno~